The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-08-13
THE POSTAL CARD.
A Criticism of the Senseless Prejudice Against
q Convenient Messenger.

Criticism of the senseless Prejudice A gainst
Convenient Messenger.
One of the immortals who figured in the
Shakespeare and his Friends" of last Novem-
oersiHarpers, a,well-known litterateur and jour-
naist, lately replied to a business message writ
ten upon a postal card.
If I had had postal card. which. thank
heaven, never do have, should have told you
sooner that" etc, etc A Henry-James young
man, one of his .isprigged-china" Species high
ly-cultivated youth. graduate both of Harvard
and Oxford, being told of a change in the en-
craving of the United States postal cards, loftily
replied: Indeedl But I a postal
card .. Both these persons intended a reouke to
the vuigarity that could accept the service of SO
cheap common messenger. But neither sue
ceeded In the attempt. To one was answered,
"As L am never without postal cards. thank
heaven, L can tell you at once that ETC., etc.
To the other, Neither does red Indian"
People whose sole superiority to the general
average of the world consists of a nasal hexibil-
bllity. prike themselves upon even such utterly
senseless prejudices this Why they do, or
why they can. is matter of mere conjecture
entirely outside human reasoning. No sensible
person nowadays deprives himself of the service
of these trustworthy and convenient little mes
sengers. Those who do SO deprive themselves
are the orderof men who scorns straw hats in
our tropical Augusts because the Prince of
Wales wears a wooden or silk one all the year
round. 1t is too late in this, our day of public
message sending, of telegraph, telephone and
running messenger boys. to draw the lin
against the voiceless swift messenger which
runs with all letters feetness through the
mails and arrives at its errand's end among more
secretive appearing letters, likely as Eot hav-
ing not once revealed its message the
way People rarely trouble themselves
for them. Not enough is to be
gathered from them to pay for the trouble. And
if it still occurs in kalamazoo or Pentagoet that
the inQuIsitive laudady or housemaid or the
prving fellow boarder steals the mute messen-
gers message from it, how that vulgsrize
the messenger? Such superiority consists in
contempt for the postal card should utterly re-
frain from using the telephone with the chance
OF its every message being shouted into
dozens of ears should avoid the public telegraph
and above all things keep its own name and face
out OF the public prints Men who weave daily
and hourly their innermost substance into vul-
gar copy have but frail standing ground
against the vulgar publicity of the postal card.
We need only to imagine what boon and bless
ing the postal-card would have been during our
war when ink, letter paper and stamps were as
understandable as fairy gold, and tens OF thou
ciIed word to realize that even the postalcard
can have wonderful dignity. event. vidi. Wei"
would not have failed to become historic even
had Cesar used postal card. Probably Mr.
Gladstone is the champion postal card writer of
the world. Probably, Also not even one OF
Shakespeare and his friends" would accuse
the ex Premier of vulgarity.
distinguished family to which much faint
of vucarity clings clings to fresh water lilies,
a family that has sent representatives to the
camp. the court, and the grove, and the mem
bers of which are widely separated makes it's
own use of postal cards Every morning those
of them who remain in the homestead. write
postal cards. all exactly the same words to
those who are away. Sometimes they say only,
John came, Jane went" 1.-The frat in
bloom," Letters from Kate" ''The old elm
blown down in the night; but to those far away
they sensitive vibrations of the cord that
binds that family together as families rarely
bound. after the different interest of separate
homes and occupations have divided them. 1t
would be a carriou- keen taste indeed that could
find aught common or unclean in such postal
cards.